Fact Seven: All the evidence points to one conclusion: Garn Goch was a major Neolithic festival site.

There is convincing evidence that Garn Goch was a large Neolithic site that could accommodate thousands of people camping for days, perhaps weeks, during solstices and equinoxes.

How can we know that? Well, you don’t build the Principality Stadium for 1,000 spectators, do you?

Garn Goch’s big because it needed to be big to accommodate people camping, their animals for food and sacrifices, ceremonial areas, market and trading areas, and entertainment areas. There are large landscaped areas flattened for these purposes.

But would thousands of people have travelled distances to such a festival site? Well, the world’s largest religious event today is the 50 day Kumbh Mela, and in 2019 roughly 1 in 5 Indian Hindus attended it – 220 million people.

On the basis that the Neolithic population of Britain may have been about 250,000, 1 in 5 is 50,000, but allowing for some living too far away, or not wanting to attend, we can guess that 1 in 5 of the 1 in 5 – that’s 10,000 people – could have attended Garn Goch festivals, and 5,000 would not be unreasonable.

But just hold on this is middle of nowhere Wales. Why on earth would people come all the way here from the more populated east and south of Britain?

Stonehenge you could understand. It’s much more accessible for many more people. Fair enough, but in the early Neolithic where was the Stonehenge equivalent?

The surprising answer was Pembrokeshire as the BBC 2 documentary (last broadcast in April 2021), The Lost Circle Revealed revealed as does Fact Eight.